The Godfather of Robotics
by Mountain King
Summary: A Sarah Connor Chronicles crossover with the Short Circuit films. Yes you've read that right, fortunately it’s only a one shot but never mind. John and Sarah learn there’s a robot living in plain sight. One with a connection to Skynet and the future.


The Godfather of Robotics

Authors note.  
This is a crossover with a character I've wanted to use for a long time. First I put him in with the Transformers. It didn't work. I then thought of putting him in with the current Battlestar Galactica. Still it didn't work, the lack of humanity in the new BSG really got in the way. Heck I even tried the Matrix. Still didn't work

My first problem is, as a child, I grew up watching this film about once a month. I loved it and I really can't see the lead character as evil. It would be fun though and I wold love to see someone try it. But not me. I couldn't work out how to do it and keep him in character. Then I got hold of the first season DVDs of Sarah Connor Chronicles and it all fit together. So here we go with a little one shot.

* * *

Continuity  
Set just after the season one episode The Demon Hand. Basically Derek is on his feet but nothing more important in the grand scheme of things.

As for the film, I'm taking some liberties with the where and when but only so that it fits in with the altered timeline from Sarah Connor chronicles.

* * *

Disclaimer

I don't own any of the characters used in this story, They belong to their respective owners and I make no money from using them

* * *

'Right, so long story short, we've lost the Turk.' John said looking up from his homework.

'No, not lost. We just have to find who has it.' Cameron supplied. Sarah looked between them. Amazed at how easily John treated it as a friend, more. She was a member of the family to him. Every time Sarah looked at her, heard it's voice she knew. Knew deep down it was the enemy. That one day it would be up to her or John to finish it off. Like they did the last time, with the other one John had sent back.

Her son picked at his math problems like they were week old stale pizza. The uncomfortable silence continued to drag. Cameron watching John, Sarah watching both of them.

When the door crashed open Sarah could have sworn even the Terminator jumped, it was Derek with that week's shopping. Sarah went to help, as did Cameron

'Get. The. HELL. Away from me.' Derek growled at her, at it, as he kicked the door shut.

'I'll help,' Sarah said. 'Get anything interesting for dinner?'

'Not really.' the two of them offloaded onto the table. One bag was full of computer equipment and the other had bread, some cellophane wrapped processed cheese, factory fresh ham and six boxes full of small arms ammunition.

As Derek pulled them out John joked. 'Ahh all the essentials.'

'Short range armour piercing. Full metal jacket rounds with a soft metal inner core. This ammo type would not be effective against the T-triple eight model.' Cameron said, inspecting the back of one of the boxes.

'That's not what I'm going to use them for.' Derek replied. He headed out of the kitchen and came back with a pair of nine-millimetre pistols and some clips. He began stripping the dumdum rounds from them and refilling.

'Not on the... table.' Sarah shook her head and rescued the scraps of food he had bought. Looked like meal night had just become sandwich night. As much as she loved John's father she'd had enough of the same problems with Kyle; weapons first, food last.

Cameron inspected one of the discarded bullets. 'These rounds cause maximum damage to the organic flesh and remain lodged in the endoskeleton. Causing further mobility difficulties. Allowing us to escape or use larger scale weapons. Removing remaining lead would also prove difficult...'

'We all know why we loaded the guns like this. Dead lead for pistols, armour piercing for rifles and buck shot for the twelve gauge.' John folded his homework and picked up the computer equipment.

Derek gave Cameron a dark look. 'Like I said, I'm not going after Cromartie or whatever you call him.'

'Then who are you going after?' The Terminator asked, It was a good question.

'An old wives tale. You know who the prototype for true artificial life was.'

John shrugged. 'A.I. Take your pick. You can say any computer program with adaptive properties is A.I. They've got computer games now with them that are getting faster and faster. It's just a question of how intelligent the system is.'

'I wasn't talking about A.I. I'm talking about A.F Actual Life. A robot with the ability to learn and develop. Without boundaries or morals. Only those imposed on to it by itself.'

'You're talking about self awareness. That's not possible yet, we can't build systems like Cameron yet. It's not a case of software, it's hardware. There's not a single computer system that can do it. Perhaps a network or fibre-optics or a whole bunch hard wired into themselves.' John was in his element. 'But nothing current. Even state of the art is too slow.'

'That's what we thought. Until I found this.' Derek pulled out an archive news paper cutting out from his jacket. It was from the front page, Showing a picture of a primitive looking robot, wide head that looked built simply to house the big eyes mounted far apart. A sort of V-shaped neck made out of two pistons held it to a body just out of shot.

'Number Johnny Five.' Cameron supplied. Sarah had heard the name before. When the news first broke about a robot living in New York she'd grabbed all she could about the thing. Paranoid that it was the first sign of judgement day, she needn't have bothered.

'It was a hoax.' She supplied. 'All to sell toys. Did a good job, too made the inventors a lot of money.' Derek looked at her for a moment. 'Trust me, that close to meeting Kyle. I was reading everything I could get my hands on about robots and computers.'

'It was a long shot. John never said anything about it. Still it was a story passed around the Underground. Everyone heard of Number Five, I looked him up as soon as I had the chance. Couldn't find much, no wonder if you're right. Damn, another waste of time.'

'Not a hoax.' Cameron added after a moments silence.

This got her attention, heck it got everyone's attention. 'What?' John finally asked, jaw literally falling to the floor. 'Even I've heard of the New York robot and know it was a joke.'

'Not a joke or a hoax.' Cameron said. 'Johnny Five is considered the godfather of cyber-robotics. Built as a military combat chassis with a prototype model thermal energy laser. Designed for strategic nuclear deployment near the end of the Cold War Johnny Five was the fifth unit built in the first series. Although the first run Finished at five units the Cold war was over by the time they were completed.'

She looked at them for a moment before continuing. 'Records show his programming was somehow changed by a massive power surge. it is unknown how this effected his programming, the result was a learning computer system. In his new status he fled the project and escaped.'

The resulting financial loss to the government and a lack of need for the robots led to them discontinuing the project. Several researchers were then employed at Cyberdine until its destruction.'

'And what of... Johnny?' Derek asked as he stared to load another clip.

* * *

Johnny Five rolled down the ramp in front of his home and then on to his little garden. It had been more than twenty years since he had left the city. It was for the best. People there, as everywhere, did not accept him. Those that did were often only pretending to be his friends.

In the end he realised he simply could not cope with human life on that scale and retreated. His friends understood and supported him. So now he lived in relative seclusion.

In the hills of Montana, next door so to speak to Stephanie and Newton's animal reserve Johnny's house wasn't big and it wasn't where you'd expect to find him. He had surrounded his home with plants, from trees to rose bushes. While low and consisting of a single story the house was fitted out with a satellite connection and enough computers to keep Johnny happy.

More than happy, These days he worked as a computer programmer for small companies. Well he had to admit programmer wasn't strictly true, he was more a program solver. If someone had a problem with a piece of coding they couldn't get right or just needed it checking over to make sure it does what it's supposed to do Johnny was your guy.

Mostly security programs and firewalls, it kept him going. More than enough to pay for his energy supplies and keep him up to date with the latest technology. Twice now he had to transfer himself from his original drive to something bigger. Recently moving from a standard hard-drive to the new solid state chips. A bit slow on the uptake but he had to make sure the transfer was secure.

What money he had left went to Stephanie and Newton. They almost always needed it and would use it to shelter as many animals as they could. That and his Garden were his real hobbies. He enjoyed watching them grow and more than anything else they were more accepting than most humans.

He was inspecting and pruning his carefully cultivated white rose bush when his sensors detected the approaching vehicle. He looked up and tracked it. The advantage to being on the top of a hillside was a good view. The vehicle was a military grade Jeep. Black. Johnny could make out three passengers and one driver through the tinted glass but not much more. Too far away for spectral analysis.

It wasn't the first time the military had wanted his help. Last time Johnny almost refused outright, until he found out why they wanted him. Security. He agreed, the government were not the only people worried about how secure their weapons truly were.

Finishing off his work Johnny inspected the soil. Yes a fresh supply of nutrients soon and it would be back to its healthy state. Looking up he brushed his hands off and rolled down to the dirt track. The humvee pulled up violently with a screech of dust. The back door on the opposite side exploded open and an unshaven man with a pair of hand pistols leaned over the roof.

Johnny had faced people that didn't like him before. The gang that had run him out of New York were armed with baseball bats and metal poles. Last time anyone had tried to shoot him it was Nova when they attempted to recover him. He was so shocked that someone wanted him dead he rolled back. 'Don't move robot.' The man growled

A brunette woman opened the front passenger door and another, much younger one, stepped out and around from the drivers seat. The older woman had her own semi-automatic trained on him. A young man with longish hair came out last and stayed back, just watching like the girl he noticed.

'Hey, what's going on.' Johnny held both his hands up in a non-threatening gesture.

'Well he's real.' The boy pointed out. 'What now?'

'We execute it.' The older man ground out as he jumped down and crawled through the back off the car. Keeping at least one gun aimed at all times. 'Damn it, looks just like them.'

'Like what?' Johnny asked

'Like the Centaur, land based tank unit. Designed for total annihilation of human survivors. Supported by Hunter-Killer air units and later, when the human resistance became more organised, Terminator class infiltration units.'

'Mind if I ask just what you two are talking about?' Johnny asked the mand and girl respectively

'Your kids, granddad.' The unshaven man looked at him. 'They're the weapons used to destroy the world.'

I'm a mechanical life form, I don't have children.' Johnny winced. It was beginning to look like these people were mad. The young woman especially, it was something in the way she talked. There was something off about her he couldn't pin down.

'Not yet. But in time you're going to become the biggest threat the world has ever seen.'

The girl stepped up again, she was almost standing next to him by now. 'That's not true. Number Johnny Five is a developmental dead end. While he his a leap forward in programming it was never repeated. His physical development is complete and further units designed use schematics only as reference.'

'Futher units, like you?' The boy asked.

'Yes.' She replied. Johnny shook his head slightly This discussion was going nowhere and they were still geared to shoot him but what they had just said didn't make any sense unless...

He had to know, if he had them he would say it was instinct. A gut reaction that the girl wasn't as she appeared. He activated his Spectral-Analyser.

* * *

John didn't like this. He didn't like it one bit. There was something off with the whole thing. If Cameron was right the robot had done all the damage he could by just being built. What good could come from killing him. Then something wacky happened.

The robots eyes changed, going from two flashlights to multicoloured kaleidoscopes with a quick spin. Derek cocked both guns again but the robot wasn't interested in them. It was interested in something else, Cameron.

The barn door eyelids, John guessed he could call them that, opened wide. 'Oh, my!' the robot gasped and grabbed hold of Cameron's upper arms.

Like it was sanding on tip toes, it's forward tracks moved over to it's pointed ends. Laughing the robot swooped her in its arms and spun around. Whooping in joy Johnny almost danced with her before putting her down. 'Where... I mean how... You are beautiful.' Johnny crowed with laughter again.

'I was sent into the past to protect John Connor.' She explained

He waved a hand. 'That would be me.'

'John...' his mother started.

'We're not doing this.' he interrupted. 'I'm not saying he's human but if the best and the brightest agree that he's alive we can't kill him.'

'Yes we can' Derek disagreed and fired. It was hard to say who was faster Johnny, Cameron or John. All three of them reacted too quickly. Johnny pushed Cameron out of the way. Cameron pushed Johnny and John tackled Derek to the ground.

The single shot went wide, hitting a little rose bush and exploding a bloom. 'You heard me.' John ordered, unaccustomed to the tone in his own voice. 'As your commander I'm ordering you put those down before I make you put them down.

Derek blinked hard, shocked more than he'd probably admit 'You're not my John. You can't order me.' still he put the guns down. 'This thing is the first. They all come from it, we destroy it now we win.'

'Wrong numb-nuts. 'John snapped. 'Weren't you listening; his schematics are still out there. There's probably a dozen copies in development contractors around the country . Hell, twenty years old, it might even be on the internet. What's killing him do when some kid in his mum's garage can build anew one out of a toaster and the parts from a broken TV.'

Derek looked from John to Johnny and back. 'Would anyone mind telling me why this man wants to kill me?' Johnny asked. 'Anyone?'

It wasn't much later as Cameron explained it all. The coming of Skynet, judgement day, the survivors scavenging in the wreckage and the then the war. Of how John lead humanity's fight back and how every time they thought they'd won Skynet always came back. Eventually explaining the teams both sides had sent back, to prepare or intervene where needed.

John had seen a few people react to the story. Most didn't believe it, those that did often refused to accept it. Only a few and the looks in their eyes... It looked like they had been wounded in their very soul. That same haunted, emphatic, pain was in Johnny's. How or why John never thought he would have the answer.

'I... I know I must say something. Only I don't know what.' The robot sank into the ground. 'When I was younger I wanted to fit in, be human. When I did everything I still wasn't accepted by people. If machines can do all that I am ashamed. Ashamed that somehow my existence contributes to this... Evil.'

'Ashamed?' John's mother echoed. It was the first thing she had said. 'You know what shame is.'

'Is that so difficult? To know that... that your own people can cause death on such a scale.'

'They're not your own people.' John corrected him.

'But they are.' Johnny put a three fingered hand on Cameron's shoulder. We're the same species. The same people.'

'Are we?' She asked him

'I...'

'You're not the same,' John's mother said quietly. 'Like you said, shame. You grieve. I don't know how or why but you do. They don't, she's just a heartless killing machine built for one thing. To hunt and kill humans.'

Cameron 'That is correct. Emotions are simply programmable responses to stimuli. Such responses take time and can effect the decision making process. Early experiments resulted in homicidal tendencies and further uncontrollable behaviour.

'You don't feel anything then? It is small wonder you can commit these... Things.' Johnny looked sad, it was something to do with those barn doors. The way they moved could display all sorts of emotions. Right now he was disappointed. 'And what of me? What becomes of me on this judgement day.'

'All record of your existence ends. An investigation force sent to recover your body. It found this site destroyed from the nearby nuclear blast, aimed at the military compound ten miles due east. The electromagnetic pulse erased all data files in the remaining computers.'

'Well I guess that's one way to go.' Derek fought down a smirk. 'The grandfather of these things killed in their revolution. It's almost French.'

'More like the Russian Revolution, if you can forgive the simile.' John smiled ruefully.

'Which was hijacked by the wrong people, twisted into something it shouldn't have been.' His mother said sadly. 'Johnny, if all the Skynet robots were like you I'd like to think it would never happen. That one day... one day we could live together equally and not afraid of each other.'

'Humanity is afraid of itself. Fearing machines is just the next step.' Johnny looked at Cameron again. 'We are from the same people. We're both machines. I can only hope that, even if you are never built with emotions, that which built you has them.'

'This had been one hell of a road trip hasn't it' John joked, not knowing what else to say.

'It's been one hell of a road trip.' Cameron replied Unthinkingly

Johnny laughed. 'What do you know there's hope for you yet.'

* * *

June 2026  
A secret underground bunker

Johnny Five rolled down the corridor, he resisted humming his favourite little tune as he pulled to a stop and knocked quietly on a section of wall. It slid out and a small Eye-scanner came out of a hatch in the wall. one of Johnny own design. Johnny extended an eye and let it read him.

Another hidden door on the other side of the corridor opened and John was already there. The man had grown, sort of. John was the same height as he was when Johnny first met him. Only he had changed in more subtle ways. A half grown beard and a tightness around his eyes that had grown there.

'Is she ready?' he asked in that voice of his. A lot of people would have thought he was cold, the truth was the man held back a lifetime of pain behind that empty tone of voice.

'She is, took a lot of doing but she's finished.'

There was the briefest of smiles on John's face. but it left quickly. 'Everything?'

'All the modifications and enhancements, programming or otherwise, are done. Cameron is exactly as you remember her.'

'Your cover story?' John asked. as he stepped out of the doorway and walked down the corridor

Johnny rolled just behind 'I just checked the record she already had. My little magic trick fooled them as it did Nova all those years ago. I reboot her, leave and you can start her education.'

'First lesson. Pancakes.' John said without a hint of a smile

End Godfather of Robotics

* * *

If anyone out there had a mental vision off of Johnny Five as some kind of "mafia don" with trench coat and hat I strongly suggest finding help...

Mountain King  
AKA Thomas Fishwick


End file.
